How to Define Your Target Audience
How to Define Your Target Audience
Reaching new
audiences is easy with YouTube ads, but it allstarts by definingyour target audience.
You’ll need
to brainstorm and figure out which types of people would be interested in your product
or service. That will be based on things like age, location, socio-economic
status, educational level, interests, etc.
Don’t be
vague, either. “Men” or “Women” just won’t work. Think more along the lines of
“30-something career women with 2 children who are interested in starting a
home-based business.”
The key is to narrow down your search as far as possible.
Market
research, and being able to define your target audience in a nutshell is
important in understanding the customer and how they are going to make purchase
decisions.
Targeting a
specific audience will also help your ad campaigns reach the right people—those
who will relate to your company’s message and will be interested in your products
or services.
Let’s say
your company is marketing a new educational toy. Your target audiences might be
children who are X-years old, parents, grandparents, teachers, and maybe
educational specialists.
Now you only
need to target those people with your ads to find some potential clients! You
can insert your ad into anything from a children’s video to an educational show
for parents—whatever you believe is not only relevant, but likely to trigger a
positive response.
That way,
you’d get the exposure to different audiences for the same basic ad. Of course,
you’d want to tweak the ad to appeal to different ages and demographics.
Remember
that your target audience isn’t the same as your target market.
Both are
centered around dividing customers into different groups to help you make
informed business decisions.
A target
market, however, is a specific group of
consumers at whom your company’s products and services are aimed.
A target
audience defines that that group using demographics,
interests, and buying history.
To put it
another way, you can define your target market by finding your target audience.
For example,
if your target market is “young men aged 20-35,” your target audience might be
“young men aged 20-35 living in New York City.”
You can then
divide your audience into groups or further define them using categories like
the following:
Purchase Intention: a group of people looking for a specific product or
service who are looking for more information before they purchase.
Examples
would be consumers in the market for a laptop, automobile, television, or an
item of clothing. This sort of information is important so you can see how to
better direct your messages to your audience.
Interests: a
group of people who are interested in the same thing, like hiking or knitting
or basketball.
Knowing this
information helps you to connect with your audience in a relatable way and
figure out buyer behaviors and motivation.
For example,
customers interested in baseball memorabilia would most likely be interested
during baseball season, when they can show off their purchases during the
games.
Another
example: if you discover that a large group of your audience is interested in
eating out, you could figure out a way to work that into your ads and attract
even more attention.
Subcultures:
groups of people who identify with a shared experience, like a certain music
scene or entertainment genre.
People
define themselves by these subcultures and you can use those to better
understand who you’re reaching out to.
For example,
if you think of how a certain subculture relates to your business—especially if
you have a large potential audience—then you’re reaching your subculture.
Think of how
Netflix markets to its different subcultures (people who like comedy, science-fiction,
horror, and anime) using social media accounts directed at those groups.....